"You know, Annabeth, we're trying everything," Thalia said through the Iris Message. "I want to find my Kelp Head of a cousin as much as you want to."
Annabeth sighed, messing with a drachma in her hand. "I know you're trying, Thals. But's it's been six months with nothing to show for it!" Her voice dropped into a whisper. "I miss him."
"I know you do, kiddo. Did you try Iris messaging Poseidon?"
"I've tried everything! And he doesn't even pick up," Annabeth added glumly.
Through the message, Annabeth saw Thalia looking past her and said, "Look, I've got to go. I'll catch you up if we find anything."
"Thank you."
Thalia shrugged. "What are friends for?"
Annabeth then wiped her hand through the rainbow and flopped onto her bed. Six months of nothing. Percy had kissed her good night, and the next thing she knows he vanished without a trace. Annabeth tried everything to find him: Iris messaging his parents and her mother, searching through his entire cabin, and she even went so far to ask Blackjack if he had seen her boyfriend. Of course, she didn't understand him, but the Pegasus kept swinging his head back and forth; Annabeth took that as a no.
The first few days had been torture. It had been three months after Kronos was defeated, three months that they had been together, and Percy had been the best boyfriend possible. Well, he tried at least. There's a reason Annabeth called him Seaweed Brain.
Subconsciously, Annabeth's hand went to the piece of red coral that hung on a cord around her neck. It was Percy's three month anniversary gift to her. Her fingers traced the familiar bumps and depressions in the coral, counting them as she did so. 1…2…3…
Annabeth felt the stinging of tears in her eyes, and she furiously wiped them away. No, she wouldn't cry. After Jason came to camp as predicted by Hera and he got his memory back, he had been able to remember the name of his Roman camp: Camp Jupiter. Even though Jason was a great guy, he wasn't Percy-not by a long shot.
She had become so emotional about her MIA boyfriend that the slightest reminder of Percy was enough to cause her to break down into a puddle of tears. Annabeth shivered, reached over her bed to her trunk, and pulled out a sweatshirt that was three sizes top big on her that read: Goode High School-Swimming Team. Other than a few pictures, his sweatshirt, and the coral, Annabeth didn't own anything of Percy's. And she'd eventually have to give the sweatshirt back.
Desperately trying not to fall into a downward spiral of memories, Annabeth crossed the Athena cabin to her desk. Her laptop given to her by Daedalus was sitting untouched with its blue delta sign glowing. She started the computer up, and while it went through updates, she caught a glance at her bulletin board. Annabeth had blueprints and sketches everywhere, but in the bottom right hand corner closest to her was a selfie Percy had taken of them. His finger had slightly covered the camera, but she could still see herself entirely and make out Percy's sea green eyes, full of mirth, just like she remembered.
Gently tugging the tack out of its place, Annabeth held the picture in her hand. She remembered them having a picnic in the strawberry fields, shoving strawberries into each other's mouth (Much to the annoyance of the Demeter cabin) while talking about their sophomore year of high school.
Too late she realized that by remembering Percy she burst her dam of feelings that she had been trying for so long to keep hidden. Annabeth slammed her laptop shut and clutched the picture like it was a lifeline as she uncontrollably sobbed.
Immediately she felt someone put their hands on her shoulders saying, "It's okay, Annie. You'll see him soon, I promise."
"Two months is soon, Malcom?!" Annabeth shouted at her brother while he held his older sister tighter.
Normally Malcom would've flinched, but he was so used to Annabeth breaking down that he was used to it now.
"It has to be better than restarting the eight months, right?" Malcom asked unsurely. With Annabeth's new found fragility, he had unofficially become the new head counselor of the Athena cabin. "Look, I know Percy's dense, but you know how well he can defend himself with Riptide. Plus, he still has the Curse of Achilles; as long as no one hits his mortal point he'll be fine."
"Yeah, but what if they find his mortal point? Last I checked, his armor was still in his cabin," Annabeth protested.
Malcom sighed. "Look, Annabeth, I know you miss Percy-everyone does-but you've got to understand that everything will turn out alright. I promise."
That's what you would think. Annabeth thought to herself, the silver coin Minerva had given her leaving an icy burn in her pocket. "Follow the Mark of Athena. Avenge me."
Annabeth shuddered involuntarily at the thought causing her brother to hold her tighter.
"You'll find him; I know you will," Malcom said as he left Annabeth alone with her memories and the picture.
Once Annabeth was sure that her siblings had gone off to their archery lesson, she held the picture above her heart and began crying, letting the tears freely fall down her face. For too long she had been hoping for some kind of sign from Olympus to let her know that her boyfriend was alive, but other than Hera's forced exchange (As she liked to put it) she had no insights on to where Percy was.
"Percy, I'm missing you," Annabeth whispered to herself softly as she cried herself to sleep.
Line Break
"I think she's getting worse, Chiron," Malcom said, reporting about Annabeth to what she considered a second father. "She's so fragile now, and I think it's the fourth time today that she's broken down."
"Show her the video we've prepared," Chiron said.
"A-are you sure, sir? How do we know this won't do more damage?"
Chiron gave the demigod a kind smile. "Well, we won't know until we try, now will we? Go, grab your sister and I'll get Argus to summon the others."
"Amphitheater?"
"As usual."
"Mr. D is going to kill us for having a projector and laptop," Malcom mumbled under his breath before running out of the Big House, praying that nothing went wrong until after the video played.
0o0o
In only a matter of ten minutes, there were all four-hundred something campers seated in an arc around where the screen had been set up. Chiron was fiddling around with one of the wires to get the colors how they were supposed to look and not magenta (One of the Athena kids helped out with that). And, of course, Annabeth was seated up front with Clarisse and Piper sitting on either side of her while Jason and Leo were next to Piper.
Malcom scowled at the laptop when it ran through its updates until the video he had finally loaded up. Once everything was ready, Malcom turned to Chiron and gave him a thumbs up.
Chiron cleared his throat. "Everyone, could I have your attention, please?" The arena went silent almost instantly. Rumors had already begun to spread about what they were going to show-an anti-bullying video, some other stupid thing that happened on Olympus, or gods forbid Hades in pink, sparkly underwear dancing with a rubber chicken on his head.
"This slideshow has been put together in the strictest confidence under the guidance of the Athena cabin and all of Percy Jackson's closest friends," Chiron said, sparing Annabeth glance. His look seemed to say: All except for Annabeth.
"Now, at first this was just going to be a gift to Ms. Chase, but I thought you would all benefit from watching. Please enjoy." Chiron trotted off to the side giving everyone a clean shot of the video.
The first picture hadn't even flashed up yet, and Annabeth was already on the verge of tears. It would be too much to see pictures of her Seaweed Brain on some dumb screen and not near her, here in Camp Half-Blood with all his friends rather than somewhere in California.
Shocking everyone, the video started out with a small video snippet from something that had happened around four years ago.
"Ew! He's drooling!" A twelve-year-old Annabeth complained as she wiped an unconscious Percy's mouth.
"Come on, Annie," a familiar voice said-well, familiar to a few anyways. "You said you wanted to take care of him."
Annabeth scowled. "Shut up, Luke. Just because I think he might be the one doesn't mean I want to be the one cleaning up slobber. It's demeaning. Hey! Are you recording this?"
Luke's hand passed in front of the lens momentarily. "Nope, it's off."
"I don't believe you; let me see."
"No."
"Mom?" Percy mumbled, still out of it.
Annabeth looked a Luke pleadingly. "Go, I've got to force feed him ambrosia now. I'll see you later?"
Luke laughed. "Of course. We've still got strategy to discuss."
"I don't want the red Ring Pop, Mommy! I want BLUE!" Percy screamed in his sleep, eliciting laughter from many-if not all-the campers.
"Go!" Annabeth exclaimed one last time, pushing the camera away from her.
From there on many pictures of Percy were included as a young kid-thanks to Sally for that-and hidden pictures the Stoll brothers took of him and Annabeth. Rachel had also added some of her artwork of how Percy looked in battle, which was actually scary accurate as to how Percy did look in battle. It raised Annabeth's suspicions slightly, but she quickly dismissed the feelings. Rachel was the oracle and an artist, it made sense that she's be able to draw like that.
Annabeth found herself blushing madly when a picture of her and Percy cuddling in a clearing in the woods they had found that day for a picnic. How did they know where the two of them were going to be that day?
Another round of laughter came from everyone when there was a picture of Percy being around seven with blue cake and frosting dousing him from head to toe while having a huge gap in his teeth from his two missing teeth, his smile and eyes showing pure happiness and innocence.
The video lasted at least twenty minutes, but after that no one was really keeping track. The final part of the video consisted of people telling their stories about meeting Percy, his personality and what they thought of him etc., etc. It was mostly the older campers recounting their stories along with Grover, Chiron, Thalia-they pulled her from the Hunt for a day-Mr. D-it was mandatory-and Juniper. They even went so far as to asking Poseidon to send a DVD with his opinions on his son-we all know how that's going to end-and surprisingly, they got it with a note saying: Don't let Zeus know J!
Annabeth felt herself get teary eyed at all the kind words her friends had said about Percy, but what really shocked Annabeth was the fact that she had a part in the video despite not knowing anything about this at all.
"Where do you want me to start?" Annabeth had asked, her eyes clearly not focused on the camera that was hidden somewhere (It was in Malcom's reporter hat).
"Wherever you want. How Percy makes you feel, what he's like, stuff like that," Malcom said.
"Gods, where do I start? I can truthfully say that I have never met anyone quite like Percy, and honestly sometimes I think it's for better and for worse. He's so dense sometimes that I would like to slap him upside the head, so a single thought can process in that head of his. His name is Seaweed Brain for a reason."
"Seaweed Brain? How'd that come about?"
Annabeth blushed. "Uh, it was something I said and meant as an insult at the time, but now it's kind of like my nickname for Percy. The first time I called him that was right about when we left for his quest to save Zeus' bolt."
"How does Percy make you feel?"
"Secure, definitely," Annabeth answered without hesitation. "We've kept each other safe so many times that 'secure' is a good word to cover that. Not to mention how happy I am whenever I see him flash his joker smile that lights his face up like nothing else in this world. I…Malcom! You're laughing at me!"
You could hear Malcom's giggle. "No, I'm not. Continue, please, this was about to get good."
Annabeth huffed. "Remind me again why I agreed to this. You want me to continue? Fine. I love Percy. There, I said it! Feel free to blackmail me or whatever with it-just don't show this to Percy ever."
Malcom laughed again. "I won't blackmail you this once, Annie, but I make no promises on the second thing.
"Don't call me Annie! Now, get back here before I destroy that camera!" Annabeth screeched.
The slideshow finally ended with a picture of the campers throwing the two love birds into the lake on Percy's birthday, the day they had officially gotten together.
Annabeth was crying tears of joy as well as sadness, but she felt something that she hadn't felt in a long time: hope. Hope that she will see Percy soon. Hope that things turn out for the better.
She let Clarisse and Piper wrap their arms around her in a hug. Annabeth might've been missing Percy, but she knew that one day-whenever it may be-Percy would come back to her. For the first time since his disappearance, Annabeth finally felt at peace with herself, relaxing in the warm April night.
A/N: Little Percabeth one-shot that I've had written for the longest time! Thanks for reading, Sparks! ~RainbowSpark18
